“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Pachuca can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pachuca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. Pachuca have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Pachuca know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
In brief
The terracesEverybody has an opinion about Alan Mozo
The fee was agreed and the flight was looked at — and then the phone stopped ringing. Monterrey moved on, René López reports back to Pachuca, and everybody pretends Monday is just Monday.
Sergio Barreto was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Marked 8.38 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Shots: 11. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Pachuca can pretend not to have heard.
The fee is $360.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Tijuana drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pachuca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Shots: 12. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
The offer from Bayer Leverkusen for Eliás Montiel was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Pachuca can pretend not to have heard.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Sergio Barreto was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Marked 8.56 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
The offer from Club America for Sergio Barreto was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Pachuca, and it is not being withdrawn.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 28 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
The fee is $2.1M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Toluca drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 24 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pachuca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Pachuca can pretend not to have heard.
The offer from Santos Laguna for Oussama Idrissi was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Enner Valencia was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Houston Dynamo will make the call about Juan Cantú this week. Pachuca have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Pachuca, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pachuca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Add another name to the list: Houston Dynamo have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Juan Cantú. The answer from Pachuca has not changed — yet.